Liverpool teen charged with cyberbullying fellow student

RCMP have charged a 16-year-old Liverpool, N.S., youth with criminal harassment in a case that allegedly targeted a 15-year-old Queens County boy.

"Today, he's a little better, knowing that there has been a charge laid and knowing that this individual is not allowed to have any contact with him, even in school," the 15-year-old's mother said.

Because of her son's age and the age of his accused tormentor, CBC News is not identifying them.

Threatened online and in person

Queens District RCMP said in a release that they received a complaint that a boy had been harassed and threatened online and in person.

While the boy's mother said she's happy a charge has been laid, she said she was frustrated with how police and the local school had handled her son's case.

She took to social media, posting screengrabs of a Facebook chat in which her son was threatened and ridiculed using profane and sexually explicit language. One post included a picture of wrist with a knife poised over it and the caption "Why don't u."

"It's far deeper than what people think," the boy's mother said.

"I think people think that someone's just on there calling somebody a name and it's not... They're pretty much telling my son to kill himself and that he's worthless and he can't do anything, calling him even more nasty names than that."

The mother said people need to report every incident of cyberbullying they encounter to make sure something is done about it.

The teen in this case is due to appear in provincial court in Bridgewater on June 7.